Celebrating César Chávez 31 March 2009

Today is a legal holiday in California and an optional one in 8 other U.S. States. (Hmmm…wonder what happened to Obama’s call last year for it to become a National Holiday??)

I regret that my study of food, agriculture and human rights did not begin until many years after the death of a man whom I know far too little about, but admire deeply – César Chávez.

JumbleSon and I are making a trip to the library today to look at their Chávez exhibit and pick up a copy of this book.

And, while we lean towards unschooling, I’m not opposed to picking and choosing bits from established curricula every now and again. So, I think we’ll be taking a look at some of the ideas from California’s K-3 Cesar Chavez Day curriculum this week. Much of it will likely be a too old for the JumblyOne and too full of “good citizen” lingo for me, but I’ll hope to find some things we can use.

It’s never too early to talk about socio-economic justice for all.

Inauguration 23 January 2009

Yo Yo Ma and Friends Perform

No doubt just about every other blog you’ve read this week has been talking about the Big Event - the inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama to the Presidency of the United States of America. [tears of joy]

JumbleSon and I attended a Brunch, featuring TV coverage of the Event, on the morning of the 20th.  We made it through the most important bits (seeing YoYo Ma perform was most important to JumbleSon, and watching Obama take the Oath of Office for me) before the little Explorer tried to ransack our dear neighbor, Molly’s, tidy home and we had to leave.

So, I didn’t get to hear my President’s first speech, live.  Thankfully, it’s everywhere on the Internet, so I was able to catch it after the fact.

This passage really touched me:

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds.

And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders, nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect.

- Text of President Obama’s Inauguration Speech

The primary reason I am vegan is because I am blessed with relative plenty, and have a choice.  I hope that my daily choice to abstain from using animal products means that someone who doesn’t have options may eat, be clothed and, maybe even one day, have the opportunity to choose veganism so that the cycle may begin again until all are fed.

Eleanor Roosevelt with Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)

Obviously, there’s so much more to ending hunger and malnutrition than this lowly Jumble’s efforts to vote with animal-free dollars, or even to focus her research and writing on the human right to food.  Having the President of the United States on board – I mean really on board – for the first time since the Roosevelts could make a world of difference.

By a vote of 180 in favour to 1 against (United States) and no abstentions, the Committee also approved a resolution on the right to food, by which the Assembly would “consider it intolerable” that more than 6 million children still died every year from hunger-related illness before their fifth birthday, and that the number of undernourished people had grown to about 923 million worldwide, at the same time that the planet could produce enough food to feed 12 billion people, or twice the world’s present population.

- U.N. General Assembly report 24 November 2008

The United States’ take on the human right to food over the past 40 years rings loud and clear in consistent UN votes like this one.  Freedom from hunger has been viewed as an aspiration, not a legal right.

The U.S. Working Group on the Food Crisis has called on the President to make significant changes in food policy to, among other things,

Guarantee the right to healthy food by building local and regional food systems and fostering social, ecological and economic justice

• Call on the US to join the community of nations supporting the human right to food.
• Support domestic food production and independent community-based food businesses in the United States and around the world.
• Establish living wages, so that everyone can afford healthy food.
• Implement full workers’ rights for farmworkers and other food system workers.
• Strengthen the social safety net for low-income people across the US.
• Create a solidarity economy that puts people before profit in the United States and around the world.

President Obama has a smörgåsbord of critical issues to deal with right now, but I hope there will be room on his plate for food.

Three Cups of Tears 2 January 2009

I tried to calm my nerves as I watched a large African man approach.  Standing on the steps of a brick school building at 6:45am,  I was planning to introduce myself before my 1 1/2 hour shift started.

He unlocked the doors and greeted me warmly,  “As-salaam Alaikum.”

I didn’t know what he had said, but it was clear that I didn’t need much of an introduction.  He knew who I was.

Standing side by side with him week after week, I listened to him greet the children and their concerned parents as they entered the school.  I learned that the response to “Peace be with you” in Arabic is “wa `Alaikum As-Salaam” which translates to “and upon you be peace.”

Soon after 9/11 JumbleSpouse and I joined other peace activists in front of Mosques and Sikh temples (as the Sikh’s were also targets of ignorant hate crimes because of their dress) around the city.  We would arrive in shifts and hang out for an hour or two, talking with the Faithful, and waving and smiling at cars passing by, trying to demonstrate that these buildings housed our neighbors and friends, not terrorists.  We were often graciously invited in to hear the Koran sung (something that I could listen to all day – it’s so incredibly beautiful), or to share simple but delicious Sikh meals.

While these experiences were memorable and bittersweet, it was my solo watch in the misty Seattle mornings at the Islamic school that touched me most.  Perhaps that is why I reacted so strongly to Three Cups of Tea:  One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace…One School at a Time.

Every time I think about the 331 page epic I just finished, tears well up in my eyes.  I am pretty sure I’ve never cried my way through any book as I did this one.

As a result, I’m having trouble putting my thoughts in to words, so I will talk objectively as I can about the writing style first.

This book is half memoir, half interview, which makes sense as it was co-authored by Greg Mortenson, the Director and Co-Founder of the Central Asia Institute and David Oliver Relin, an investigative reporter.

Though initially, it took some getting used to – the rapid shift between direct Mortenson quotes by Relin,  and Mortenson’s own narrative – I didn’t mind it once the story really got rolling.

And once it did!  Action. Adventure. Romance.  Terror. Beauty. Hope. Fear.  And so much joy!  What a journey.  I am so grateful that they gave the time and enormous energy required to put this book into print.

As a student of Women in Development, I appreciated the references to Helena Norberg-Hodge’s work.  And was blown away by Mortenson’s ability to sensitively and successfully bring about positive change for women in remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan (never mind the fact that it’s a miracle he’s still alive).

Ethnic Diversity in Pakistan (1973)

I think my only complaint is that I wanted more detail.  I wanted to know more about life in all of the culturally diverse villages touched by Greg Mortenson and the CAI, about how Mortenson – seemingly effortlessly – fit in to these radically un-American, non-Western societies, and about what happened next.

The story ended (as much as I can tell) in early 2004.  I’m so ready for the sequel, which, hopefully will be written, and will detail Mortenson’s Noble Peace Prize-worthy work in Afghanistan, as well as give us updates on what has happened with Jahan, the first educated woman of Korphe who started medical training, and all of the others we met in this first book.

Happily, there is a pictorial follow up called Journey of Hope available for download.

Now for the serious evangelism…

Hurry!  Click!  Buy! Today!  Donate 7% of the proceeds to the Central Asia Institute  if you link to Amazon through this link!  Read with tissues in hand!  Buy more!  Including the Young Adult and Children’s versions! Donate to libraries!  Give to friends!  Release copies into the wild through Bookcrossing!  Start a Pennies for Peace Campaign.

This is my plan, because, as Jean Hoerni, Financier and Co-Founder of CAI noted, “‘Americans care about Buddhists, not Muslims.’”  May we prove him wrong.

As-salaam Alaikum.

Central Asia Institute

Holiday Cards 31 December 2008

The buzz word of the day is upcycle.

“Upcycling is the practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater use and value.” – William McDonough and Michael Braungart in Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things.

Because I never take time to come up with a clever way to display my holiday greeting cards, by the end of December I am ready to clear the jumbled mass of paper.  I’m sure I’ll do better next year.  Maybe displaying them like this.

But for now, I have to deal with the clutter.

Step 1:  Cut all the pictures out of photo cards, keeping the sides with names of senders in the separate pile with paper cards

Step 2: Sit with JumbleSon and replace all of last year’s photos in his “Friends and Family” cheap-o plastic photo sleeve album with new ones.  (Note to self:  make nicer, keep-sake album in near future)  Talk about each person and his/her relationship to us (who, what, where, etc.).  Repeat often.

Step 3:  Reread each card, letter, etc. and send New Year’s greeting to each person who sent card or photo (ok, so I haven’t exactly done this yet but I’ll get there before the end of January)

Step 4:  Discard photo card bits and prepare to upcycle paper cards

Step 5:  Execute upcycling plan

There are some excellent ideas of ways to get more life out of greeting cards over at Crafting a Green World.

This year however, we are opting to do a used greeting card drive in our condo complex.  Everything we collect in this envelope on our door (including our own cards) will go to St. Jude’s Ranch for Children and their recycled card program.

Card Collection Envelope

What about you?  What will you do with all those holiday greetings this year?

Eat the View 19 December 2008

Long before I sported my nifty “Food Not Bombs” button, I was a proponent of “Food Not Lawns“.

Now there’s a chance to turn our most famous lawn into a garden of culinary delights…

Roger of Kitchen Gardeners International has started a campaign and petition to turn the White House lawn into an organic vegetable garden that will provide food for Presidential meals, as well as local food banks.

I think this is positively brilliant!

If you’re so inclined, please ask President-Elect Obama to eat his view.

Healthy Toys 10 December 2008

Mandatory testing for phthalates and lead in toys sounds like a great idea.  But the sad part, of course, is that it isn’t really.  (I ask you, is any course of action ever “all good”?)

Mom Unplugged provides the low-down on U.S. Consumer Produce Safety Improvement legislation that looks solid on the outside, but at the core, is just cheap plastic.

Although the Congressional Committee was set to meet this morning to talk about implementation of this policy, it’s probably still worth the minute it takes to sign this Handmade Toy Alliance petition (if you’re in the U.S.) requesting CPSIA reforms to spare small toy makers the business-closing expense of third-party testing.  And, if your representative is on the Committee, feel free to give her/him a ring and and ear-full.

In the meantime, I’ll be checking all JumbleSon’s Christmas presents against the Healthy Toys best and worst lists.  Anything they haven’t already reviewed will be added to my “Test my toy” request list.   Let’s just hope I get through this process before he opens any of them!!